The (redundant) quarter-cent public safety sales tax

Azeltine moves to the right -- but is it genuine?

Two unexpected, positive developments occurred in the last 48 hours, regarding the proposed quarter-cent sales tax increase, which Johnson County commissioners say will be used toward public safety.  On Tuesday, Leawood City Councilman and county commission challenger James Azeltine announced his opposition to the tax, and Wednesday, The Kansas City Star editorial board expressed its opposition.

In its editorial, The Star writes:

• In recent months, the weak economy has forced many Johnson County residents and businesses to re-evaluate how they spend their money. In tight times, voters should not be expected to support raising more tax money than necessary.

The Star's Finn Bullers covered the Azeltine campaign press release on the tax.  The Azeltine press release (PDF) can be found here.

Azeltine stated:

• "This plan is out of touch with our citizens, particularly at a time when Johnson Countians are suffering from rising food and energy costs and an economic downturn."

Azeltine is running against incumbent county commissioner Dave Lindstrom.  Lindstrom is a George W. Bush Republican.  He treats people with respect, and he is pro-life.  But he is not a reliable vote on basic Republican and economic issues.

Lindstrom has supported three massive and irresponsible tax increases:  the 2006 soccer vote (rejected by voters), this public safety sales tax (on the August 2008 ballot), and another 1/8-cent sales tax (dubbed the "Bermuda Triangle" tax by Comissioner John Toplikar) that will be on the November 2008 ballot.  Lindstrom votes against private property rights.  We have never heard Lindstrom criticize the county's use of a taxpayer-funded lobbyist, nor are we aware that Lindstrom opposes the county's paid participation in the Kansas Association of Counties (a state-wide county group that generally opposes property rights, second amendment rights, and tax reform).

In short, there is a legitimate opening on the right for an economic, pro-growth conservative to challenge Lindstrom in his commission district.

Azeltine's sales tax opposition demonstrates that he is listening to the pulse of the voters and that he has courage.  But is Azeltine at all conservative?  If he is, he's a conservative in hiding.

• Azeltine is a former member of the Blue Valley Educational Foundation.  All too often, membership on area government education foundations merely means that one refuses to question the NEA, and/or that one is a friend of liberal Blue Valley Bank President Bob Regnier. 
• He supported the county's ban on smoking on private property in the unincorporated areas of the county. 
• When county government is too big already, he supports the county's taxpayer-funded art program.
• According to The Star, Azeltine is currently the Johnson County Park and Recreation District Board Chairman.  We have a neutral reaction to this.
• He supported the "soccer vote of 2006." 
• He criticizes Lindstrom for approving the funding for District Attorney Phill Kline's choices of prosecutors to investigate former DA Paul Morrison.  This in and of itself is not a big deal -- but Azeltine also donated $250 to Democrat Morrison's 2006 Attorney General's race against Kline.
• He has made other political contributions to liberal Republicans.  See attached picture in the previous post (below) of an online Government Ethics Commission report of Azeltine's contributions toward state senate and state-wide candidates.

Azeltine may be a good-government conservative in the mold of Rudy Giuliani (we don't know).  But if he wants conservative support in the district, he will need to make a strong and intentional effort to make his philosophies known. 

What is clear is that Commissioner Lindstrom has a real challenger in the November election.

What is also clear is that opposition to this sales tax is real, and it is passionate. 

But in a county that voted 60% twice for the Republican President George W. Bush, only two men in local government -- Leawood Councilman James Azeltine and John Toplikar, the lone fiscal conservative on the county commission -- have announced their firm opposition to a tax that even the far-left Kansas City Star opposes.

We won't know the outcome until 9 p.m. or so on August 5 (the Johnson County Election Office is rather slow in getting out results), but it's not looking good for the pro-tax people.

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The Kansas Republican Assembly blog researches the very, very expensive state capitol renovation -- with inflation, this is more expensive than the original construction of the Empire State Building. 

Incumbent Pat Roberts is up 51-34%.

A press release from the Roberts campaign can be found here.

Democrats aren't likely to pull off a 2008 Tom Daschle-type upset.

Republican US Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is up 48-41% in a recent Rasmussen poll.

The KRA blog has an excellent analysis of the mainstream media's selective reporting of recent polls involving incumbent Republican Senator Pat Roberts.

The Cato Institute:

• ...only about 28 states had sufficiently consistent data to do meaningful score analyses. The other 22 had changed their testing in so substantial a way since NCLB’s passage that not even three years of consistent results could be strung together. Which is the biggest non-finding finding of the report: NCLB has instigated so much test engineering — often to make assessments easier — that nearly half of all states have no useful long-term data.